Moving Forward
by Nekotsuki
Summary: The morning after Raph very nearly got his brother killed. Morning by a ninja's time, anyway. They rarely say they're sorry. [2007 movieverse]


_Sadly, this is very old work - I was digging for something else in my LJ and came across this, and realised it had never been published elsewhere. So here you go, all the way back from 2007. (And if you saw the blink-and-you'll-miss-it first upload, it was full of html errors for some reason, so I deleted and here it is again.)  
_

**Moving Forward **

Leonardo will never bring up that night on the rooftop again and neither will Raphael, but that doesn't mean Raph will ever forget.

It's not so much that they fought to begin with - dime a dozen, his screaming matches with Leo - and it isn't even his loss of control, the berserker fury that had nearly cost him his brother. The memory burns him, twists with horror in his chest when he relives how close he'd come to plunging his weapon through his brother's eye - but control is something Raph fights to hold on a regular basis, and in time the memory will become just another lesson, a reminder of what could happen if he lost his fight with anger.

These are memories that hurt and shame him but will fade with time. Rather, it's the image of Leonardo as Raphael had last seen him; bruised and shaken and holding two broken ninjaken as if they were still whole, completely off his guard as he stared Raph in the face with such searching intensity that Raph had turned and fled. When Leonardo had screamed, seconds later, and he had realised far too late that in effect, he'd abandoned his brother to their enemies.

Hell, with breaking Leo's swords and smacking him around like that, he may as well have sent a carved invitation to Winters' stone generals. Given his own encounter with them a few hours beforehand, Raph should have known that there was a large possibility that they'd be searching for him. And he'd run too far and too fast to be able to circle back in time to stop them from taking Leonardo – could barely manage to catch a glimpse of his brother, slung over the large one's shoulder like a limp sack of flour, before they'd slipped out of his grasp. His fault.

It wasn't a mistake that _Leo_ would have made.

Later, Raph had thought of apologising – something like it, anyway – when he'd dragged Leo out of the cylinder and set him back on his feet. And the words had stuck in his throat. Couldn't do it, not with Don and Mikey and the rest looking on. Instead, he'd handed over the swords Casey had obligingly carried for him and said something awkward. But Leo had given him a look and a wry smile, and Raph knew then that the rooftop was something neither of them would ever discuss.

So Raphael is in the kitchen now, making an ass of himself.

It's past two – late in the day for the rest of the world, but it had gone sunrise by the time they managed to get home. He can hear Mikey in the den, channel surfing so fast that Raph understands, surprisingly, that Mikey is just killing his boredom while he waits for the rest of the lair to come alive. Don comes through the kitchen to get his coffee fix, rolling the muscles in one shoulder stiffly. He stares long and hard at Raph, then finally quirks a small grin and vanishes back out, voice raised as he greets Splinter with respect.

Shortly after that, Don closets himself away with their father; Raph wonders if Splinter has asked to talk to him, or if Don is just being tactful and drawing away any unwanted attention. Don hasn't really been _tactful_ of late, especially where Raph is concerned - but he supposes today is one for new beginnings.

Leonardo is still sleeping.

This isn't surprising to any of them – Don has already advised the rest of them to just 'let him sleep it off'. Raphael remembers the exhaustion that followed his own encounter with Winters' sedatives and gives a small shrug, there in the privacy of the kitchen. He's not worried that Leonardo is still snug in bed, covers tucked up past his shoulders and dead to the world. But while Leo sleeps, all Raph can think about is the last time they'd eaten breakfast, when they'd stared each other down as if the simple act of eating together couldn't be allowed, just in case anyone thought they were actually on good terms.

Raphael is making scrambled eggs.

Food is a convenience for him and not an art form, and so his own skills in the kitchen are limited. He's no Michelangelo, but he can still do okay on occasion. Too many late nights as the Nightwatcher and his strained relationship with Don meant that on too many occasions Raph resorted to eggs, toast, or TV dinners instead of eating with his family. This is changing now that Leo has returned, and Raph finds that he doesn't mind in the slightest.

But Leo is sleeping, and that means Leo has missed out on breakfast. Raph has already singed himself twice on the side of the pan and kept his cursing to a dull roar, because the last thing he needs is Mikey sticking his head in the door to find out what's going on. He's pretty sure this is going to make him look stupid as hell anyway, because he's not the homemaker type, but Raph wants to make a point.

Even if he's not sure, exactly, what that point is.

Raphael scowls and dumps the whole mess onto a plate. It's still edible, just a little brown on the edges. Leo's been asleep for long enough now that he thinks he'll be okay with sneaking in to his brother's room with breakfast and shaking him awake.

And if Raph is _very_ lucky, he can leave the plate there and be gone before Leonardo is sharp enough to say a single word.

_For the record, I typed 5000 words across various projects this last month, which is more than I managed the whole year before. I'm halfway through a Zai chapter and halfway through a Snowblind chapter and three quarters of the way through a Legacy chapter. Hanging in there. Hopefully see you all soon._

_\- Nekotsuki_


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